viernes, marzo 31, 2006

There has always been a lot of fuzz about wheather science and religion are compatible. My short answer is NO. We may need to either widen or narrow the implications of "compatible" to clarify or further the discussion, but on general grounds I make an affirmation that science and religion ARE NOT compatible.

It's common to hear that both religion and science are tools to search for truth, or tools in the search of truth, but I find this really hard to buy. First of all, because on science truth is a tricky concept, there is no truth in science, but validity. You may argue about the truth of a statement, based on the evidence presented, but the validity of an argument (a scientific theory) is a different thing.

The realm of religion has always been in the ignorance of mankind. Religion tells us to believe blindly in incredible premises but doesn't allows to question its methods. Science on the other hand, shows us incredibles premises, tells us its methods, and the encourage us to question its explanations; each passing day the realm of religion is becoming more and more constrict.

Religion insists to hold the truth, but there is no validity on its arguments. There are many good ideas in religion, but at the same time there are utterly horrible sentences. How could you possibly seek validity or truth from such premises?

For religion to be compatible with science, religion must learn to adapt itself to new knowledge, to demand proof of statements, to challenge its own ideas for endurance... but then again, it wouldn't be religion.